


come out and play

by squishyjongin



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Cigarette Smoking, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Oh Sehun-centric, Pining, Slice of Life, Slow Burn, a lot of mental jongin worshipping, im just satisfying my own cravings dont mind me, its jongin doing the smoking, probably, really just two dudes transitioning college and figuring shit out, rlly i havent finished it so ill add tags as i go along, yixing is a tattoo artist and we love him
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-02
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-11-08 01:11:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17971640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/squishyjongin/pseuds/squishyjongin
Summary: It’s so easy to imagine that when their eyes meet and Jongin smiles at him with a grin that could light up an entire city, it means to him even a fraction of what it does to Sehun.And the thing is, it doesn’t.Jongin and him are friends, and that’s all there is to it. And Sehun is mostly okay with it. He’ll take what he can get.





	come out and play

“You look like a fucking chimney.”

  
Jongin looks over at him, pupils darkened beneath the sleepy curve of his eyes, but there’s no real threat in them. Sehun is too familiar with the way the corner of his mouth curls upwards on the right, teeth shining under the feeble light of the streetlamp before him. He knows the playfulness in his stance when Jongin brings the cigarette to his mouth and takes a long, slow drag, and then cocks his eyebrow and blows it directly at Sehun’s face.

He’s used to it. It doesn’t keep him from scowling and swatting at the air, but he knows the low laugh Jongin lets out as he blinks the smoke away. It doesn’t echo, not really. In fact, it gets drowned in the noises of the traffic -it’s a Friday night and Seoul is boiling with life, but Sehun can feel it bouncing in his own ribcage.

He glances back at him, and Jongin shoots him a half-assed grin that pretends to be apologetic. But Sehun knows better.

“You really need to at least cut down on that shit,” he insists, his hands balling up to fists in the bottom of his pockets. Sehun wants to walk slower. Sehun wants to pick up the pace. “I don’t want to deal with your ass when you can’t finish a routine because you’re out of air.”

“But who’ll deal with me if you don’t?” His tone is mocking. Sehun wants to smack the cigarette out of his hand.

Jongin shakes his head and flicks the butt into the street, throwing his arm around Sehun’s shoulders and pulling him closer for a moment. He leaves his hand there, hanging languidly, where it grazes Sehun’s neck each time it sways as they walk forward.

“Thanks for looking out for me,” Jongin says regardless. “But have a little more trust in me, yeah?”

Sehun’s fingernails tattoo crimson crescent moons on his palms. He shakes Jongin off. “Your hands fucking stink.”

 

  
If Sehun had to describe it, he’d say falling in love with Jongin was like the beat dropping in a dubstep song.

He thinks so as he watches him swerve through the crowd, the fabric of his T-shirt sticking to his back with sweat, and when he turns back to him, grabs his hand and pulls Sehun forward, into the maelstrom of gyrating bodies, and he blames the alcohol for the wobbling in his knees. He blames the alcohol, but Sehun knows better.

Dancing with Jongin is, Sehun thinks, somewhere between his third and fourth shot, probably not the best for his mental sanity, but Jongin doesn’t take no for an answer. And Sehun could blame the alcohol for the fact that his eyes are fixed on Jongin’s glistening neck when he throws his head back in time with the music, but he doesn’t.

He hadn’t always known, but he had felt it coming. In the end, he had to admit to the tingling sensation that bubbled up in his chest when he rolled over in the morning, greeted with the image of Jongin’s bedhead across the room, the seams of his pillow still embossed on his skin, eyes barely open. He had to admit to the spurring of his heartbeat when he got a little too close, so close that he could pick up the scent of his shampoo, and the way his fingers always seemed to twitch when they both had their hands over the table, trying to reach out and wrap around Jongin’s.

Even more so, meeting Jongin had come too easy. It had been like coming home after a long day, or like taking off a blindfold after a while of playing Marco Polo. Sehun could think that it had been all coincidence, right time, right place. But he knows better.

So when the song builds to a crescendo and comes to a halt, and everything stops for a second (strobing lights bounce off of Jongin’s skin, and Sehun doesn’t know how he’s still standing), and then comes down with a bang, louder, harder than ever, Sehun thinks _me fucking too_.

 

They aren’t big on words. In fact, their love language doesn’t quite match most of the time; but even if he would rather pick up Jongin’s nicotine addiction than say it out loud, Sehun would do anything for him.

Jongin knows this. Everyone does. And it has nothing to do with Sehun’s feelings –it’s just the way they are, and Sehun knows, with unwavering certainty, that Jongin would do anything for him, too. He always has.

So when Jongin asks him to please, please come with him, holds his hand between his fingers (Sehun’s breath doesn’t hitch, or only does so a little, but really, it’s only because he’s still sleepy and it caught him off guard), tells him that he doesn’t think he can do it without him, Sehun wants to say good, don’t. He’s about to. But then Jongin tugs at his hand and Sehun gets a good look at his face, and he’s disheveled from sleep and his hair is sticking in odd directions, the blanket he carried all the way from his bed to the couch, sliding off his bare shoulders. And his bottom lip sticks out, pink and plump and glistening, and Sehun knows Jongin doesn’t do it on purpose, doesn’t try to manipulate him, doesn’t need to. His eyes are pleading, knowing he’s asking for a lot. Knowing Sehun will cave in.

In an ideal world, Sehun would lean in and catch Jongin’s mouth in his. Jongin would throw his arms around his neck, sigh like he’s been waiting for it since the moment they met. Before that, even. He would kiss him until his lips bruised, and then kiss him again, just because he could.

Instead, Sehun looks away, mouth pursed into a thin line, his lips pale from the pressure. Unbruised.

“Fine,” he agrees at some point, when he decides he won’t be able to will the image out of his head anytime soon. He pushes it, however, somewhere to the back of his mind, right among every other fantasy he’s ever had, every one of them presenting Jongin in pristine light. “But I won’t be looking.”

In an ideal world, Jongin would jump into him, press his lips to Sehun’s so hard it’d hurt a little bit. He would throw his arms around Sehun’s neck, push him into the couch with the force of his embrace and kiss his breath away. He’d say something along the lines of “I’ve wanted to do that for so long,” thread his fingers along the strands of Sehun’s hair, stare into his eyes lovingly.

Instead, he shoots him a smile that shows all his teeth, blinding, desvastating, and his eyes crinkle into half moons and his skin is the color of raw honey and Sehun swears he can hear his heart stop for a second, only for a second, before smacking him on the shoulder with the back of his hand. Better than kissing him senseless right there and then.

At least, better than the consequences.

“Get off,” he snickers, concerned by the way his skin is heating up where Jongin is still holding him, the hand that he didn’t already free to swat him away. Jongin, as if to provoke him, holds it a little tighter. His nose scrunches up, morphing his smile into a playful scowl. He looks like an oversized puppy. Sehun wants to cry. He pulls back and goes to get up, and Jongin’s hand falls empty at his lap, but his smile doesn’t falter. “God, what did I ever sign up for by becoming your friend?”

 

Seated on a spare chair in the corner of the tiny room, Sehun looks up at the intersecting walls before him, covered from top to bottom with scraps of transluscent paper depicting various designs in disparate styles. Some of them plain linework, some impressively realistic, Sehun becomes vaguely aware that there are people walking around in Korea (maybe even further away) carrying these designs on their body, on display for everyone to see, or hidden in nooks and crannies only a lover might get to view. He realizes that maybe one day, a piece of Jongin will also hang on these walls, and be looked at by unknowing eyes that see them as nothing but a piece of paper, like these are to Sehun.

But today is not that day. Today, Jongin sits on a tattoo bed that reminds Sehun of the dentist, his legs swinging sideways and his fingers grasping the edge so tight his knuckles are turning an unusual shade of light tan. If he narrows his eyes, Sehun can almost see Jongin’s face go a little bit green, his pupils spiraling out of their orbit, like the main character in a cartoon from the nineties, as he tries his best to look at anything but the objects the guy sitting right across from him is manipulating with gloved hands. Sitting on a stool, the cushion made of a black leather that matches the tattoo chair, a man that looks barely any older than them unpacks a series of disposables from their wrappings, aligning them on a silver tray and spraying them with antiseptic. It’s unexpectedly medical. From beneath his obsidian latex gloves and rising onto his forearms and biceps (and, Sehun suspects, even past the hem of his short sleeves), a web of designs interlock into a tight net in red and black ink. In the negative spaces, Sehun sees bits of skin that match the alabaster shade in the guy’s face, but these open areas are so scarce that Sehun can’t help but wonder if he ever feels truly naked.

“Alright,” he says once he stops unpacking bits and pieces, clapping his hands together once. Yixing –he introduced himself when they walked into the room, Jongin greeting him with a tiny voice and Sehun granting nothing but a nod in his direction– looks at Jongin directly, and the boy casts a short but panicked glance in Sehun’s direction. From the small desk at Yixing’s right, both covered in stuff and satisfyingly neat, the instruments seem to emit an evil, threatening shine. “All ready!”

Jongin nods, his lips pressed together tightly, and he makes the mistake of looking at the silver tray for just a moment before setting his eyes back on Sehun. He reads an unmistakable “I could still leave” in them, and because Jongin’s been whining about wanting to do this for months on end, and because they’ve come too far to back down now, Sehun stands up from his seat and walks the few steps that separate him from the tattoo chair, and Jongin’s hand immediately shoots up at him. Sehun wraps his fingers around it, and Jongin grips him with a force he only reserves for especially tricky dance routines, or especially closed jars of raspberry jelly. “I’m ready,” he says quietly. And then he questions: “What are the pliers for?”

“To open the ring, probably,” Sehun answers. He had forced himself to look up the process, promising it’d be just one video and then that’d be it, to make sure if whoever they were giving power over Jongin’s nose fucked up, he’d notice and be able to speak up. Unfortunately, that’d ended with a Google search that went way too deep, and a coat of cold sweat all over his body. But at least he now knows what’s going on.

“That exactly,” smiles Yixing up at him. “And to close it, of course. And maybe to pull the needle through, if your cartilage is particularly thick.” He chuckles when he sees Jongin’s expression; Sehun fears he might get up and run out the door. But he doesn’t –whether it’s because he’s determined or because the fear has him locked in place, Sehun can’t tell. “Don’t worry though- it’ll be super quick. Be over before you know it.”

Jongin closes his eyes when he sees the needle approaching, and Sehun does his best not to look. But there’s something strangely hypnotizing about it, about the way the needle seems like it’d be the obvious winner in the fight against the left side of Jongin’s nose. And yet, the flesh opposes resistance, and though it’s quick and maybe if he had blinked at the wrong time he’d have missed Jongin’s wince (the grip of his hand is, however impossibly tight), Yixing bicep flexes for a fraction of a second right before the needle goes through, as if to say, “that was a good match”. He reaches back and grabs a pair of small scissors, cutting the cannula where the needle ends, the remaining piece of hollow plastic sticking proudly across Jongin’s nose. Sehun, a little lightheaded, laughs to himself. What if he just left it like this? He notices, with the part of his brain that isn’t clinging desperately to whatever’s left of his sanity, the tracks of a couple of thick tears running down the corners of Jongin’s eyes. And though he knows it’s normal (the nose and the tear ducts are connected, Sehun has done his research) he has the overwhelming urge to wipe them away with the sleeve of his sweatshirt. But that would be inappropriate. And while he’s distracted (Jongin looks a bit like one of those images of the tribes that National Geographic seems to love, coated in stripes of white paint and bodily modifications his grandma would never approve of), Yixing has opened the silver ring and is passing it through the brand new hole in Jongin’s nose, drawing a new grimace of pain from him. Another tear slips down his cheekbone, and Sehun bites down on his lip. Jongin’s hand is clammy.

A few more seconds and the ring is closed, Yixing wiping around it with a cotton swab, muttering a quiet “all done” under his breath, and Sehun lets go of Jongin’s hand. He pets his hair for a second, just for a moment, and while Jongin starts to get up on wobbly knees, he goes back to sit on his chair. He needs a minute.

They walk out of the tattoo shop minutes later, after Jongin paid Yixing and, in turn, he gave them aftercare instructions. He also gave them his number, just in case, and a pat on the back to each.

“Does it look good?” Jongin asks as they walk, turning his head to give Sehun angles, as if he hadn’t been looking at it since the moment it he got it on. The thin silver band is striking against Jongin’s bronze skin, and as much as Sehun hates needles, he has to admit that yeah, it looks better than he had expected.

“It fits you,” replies Sehun honestly. “You have the face for it. I think the tears were worth it.” Jongin smiles at him, maybe a bit sheepish, and Sehun bumps their shoulders together in their stride. “Want pizza? My treat.”

 

“I think it’s getting infected.”

The sound is muted, Jongin’s feet tapping bare on the linoleum floor, but Sehun can still hear them approaching over the tapping on his keyboard. He allows himself to finish the sentence before looking up, and in the time it takes him to wrap up his main argument, Jongin has arrived at this side, a concerned crease in his brow, a slight pout to his lips, and a cotton swab clutched in his hand.

“Why do you think so?” asks Sehun, toeing himself away from his desk on his rolling chair, turning to him slightly. Jongin’s let himself into Sehun’s room, and Sehun knows insisting on asking him to knock beforehand won’t do much of anything, despite the amount of times he’s walked in on him in compromising situations of varying levels. So he just looks up at him, adjusting his glasses over his nose, until Jongin crouches down into a squat and reaches to turn Sehun’s desk lamp in his own direction.

“It’s crusty,” Jongin says, leaning his head back. “Look, it has a scab…”

“I’m pretty sure that’s normal,” Sehun mumbles, but he still gets the hand sanitizer from his drawer and rubs it intently into his skin. As he leans in, and he’s vaguely aware of the scent of his facewash and the curve of that little bump on the bridge of Jongin’s nose and his five-o’-clock shadow, but still makes an effort to focus on the ruby the size of a pinhead that covers the spot where the silver ring connects to Jongin’s nose. He tentatively reaches a hand up to it, but as soon as his fingertip lands on it, Jongin pulls back with a wince. “Quit being a baby,” scolds Sehun in a low tone, distracted by the task at hand. “What’s on the Q-Tip?”

“The saline solution Yixing recommended…” Jongin mumbles back, angling his head back once again and putting the cotton swab in Sehun’s waiting palm.

“Be still,” he says, because he knows the little thing Jongin does when he’s in pain, and he knows he’ll scrunch up his nose in a hiss if he’s not consciously trying to fight it. So he holds the wet end to the cotton swab up to the scab, rubbing gingerly at it until he sees it starting to break apart into little pieces the color of new rust. “It’s not red or swollen,” he informs Jongin then, once he thinks he’s done with the cleaning. “I don’t think it’s infected, I think it’s just a wound trying to heal. Does it hurt?”

Jongin shakes his head, landing on his butt on the floor of Sehun’s room. The bottom hems of his sweatpants have been dragging behind him –they sometimes hang too low on his hips– and they’re starting to fray. “Only when I forget and I touch it. I tried to blow my nose and I couldn’t.”

Sehun snickers. “Leave it alone, don’t touch it. That’s probably why it’s still crusty.” He tosses the cotton swab at Jongin and turns back to his laptop, swinging one leg up so that he can rest his chin on his knee. He’s been writing this essay for far too long, and his back hurts and his muscles could use a stretch, but he needs to finish it by tonight, and he’s almost done anyway.

“Can we pay a round of FIFA, though?” asks Jongin when Sehun is in the middle of a paragraph, his fingertips hovering over the keyboard as he tries to find the right words.

“I’m busy, though,” answers Sehun mindlessly, tapping quickly when the term he was looking for comes to his mind. And for a few seconds, Jongin stays silent and Sehun thinks he might have given up, but after a moment, he hears him again.

“How long will you be busy for?” And when Sehun casts him a questioning glance, he just shrugs, unapologetic. “I’m bored.”

“Don’t you have homework too?”

“No, I already finished it.” Sehun rolls his eyes. How is he never behind?

But Sehun has a soft spot, and Jongin might not be all too aware of it, but it works in his favor nonetheless. He sighs. “I have to finish this first,” he points out, resigned.

“Fine,” Jongin complies, leaning back until the back of his head hits the floor with a soft thump, slightly damp hair fresh from the shower forming a dark halo around him, his hands rested loosely on top of his stomach. “I’ll wait, but I’m going to complain the whole time.”

 

The thing is, that’s all there is to it.

Sehun can daydream about Jongin and his beautiful, caramel skin, flawless to him even when it isn’t flawless, and the way his hair starts to curl when it gets too long, and the way his voice gets so low when he giggles and Sehun can feel it vibrating in the air and how when he laughs like this, loud and high and carefree, he thinks he would give everything he has to hear it again, to hear only this forever, but that’s all there is to it.

He can make up scenarios in which it isn’t. He can imagine, for example, when Jongin goes a couple cheap beers past his limit, that his tongue would loosen up and he’d say, slow and slurred in that way only drunk people talk, “I really wish I could kiss you right now”, spill the kind of truth people just don’t let out when they’re in their right mind. He can imagine that when they sit on the couch, watching TV on a Saturday afternoon, too lazy to do anything at all, he would cuddle up to him and rest his head on his shoulder, and when Sehun looked down at him with a question in his eyes, he would just stare right back at them before reaching up and closing the distance between their lips, all words forgotten. He can imagine that when he gets too close, so close that Sehun’s breath catches in his throat, Jongin’s heart would pick up a speed that could rival Sehun’s own. He can imagine that then, he would also consider the idea of just saying _fuck it, just fuck it, throw it all the window and let it all loose, I don’t want to miss a single thing and every second I’m not stealing the air right out of your mouth is time I’m wasting_. And it’s easy. It’s easy to imagine because Sehun’s been thinking about this for so long, he doesn’t have to try anymore.

It’s so easy to imagine that when their eyes meet and Jongin smiles at him with a grin that could light up an entire city, it means to him even a fraction of what it does to Sehun.  
And the thing is, it doesn’t. And when Jongin goes a couple cheap beers past his limit, he doesn’t slur the words Sehun craves into his ear –he just giggles and mumbles indistinctly about whatever’s going on around him. And when they sit on the couch, watching TV on a Saturday afternoon, Jongin cradles a pillow and rests his head on the back of the sofa, and his eyes stay fixed on the screen with the occasional glance over for commentary. And when they get too close, too close for comfort, Jongin never fails to keep his cool. Because that’s all there is to it. They’re just friends.

Sehun doesn’t let it get in the way. He knows a part of him will always fail to focus, he knows a part of him will always focus too much. Too much on the way Jongin seems to have a glow to him, one he isn’t even aware of; too little on everything he shines his light on –too little on anything but him. But if the alternative is having none of it at all, he’ll take it. What is the torture of his proximity, compared to the torture of the idea of his absence?

Jongin and him are friends, and that’s all there is to it. And Sehun is mostly okay with it. He’ll take what he can get.

**Author's Note:**

> here's the thing: this was going to be a one shot but i got to like 4k and absolutely nothing weighty had happened, and also ive been stuck with it and i figured maybe id do better if i knew somebody was waiting to know what happened next because rlly im as lost as u are. there isnt a tight plot or anything of the sort but i just love these boys and their dynamics and the chance to gush about jongin so if ur here for that then we're all gonna have a great time!! is it gonna get angsty? probably so, but am i gonna give yall a happy ending? hell yeah. buckle up bois its gonna be a ride  
> also: title is because of the song by billie eilish, as i find it fitting  
> also also: the opening line is from one of those prompt tumblr blogs that used to be really active a couple years ago but now isnt anymore please tell them to come back i miss them


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